Three Nights
by Shadowy Star
Summary: Gerald notices something wrong about Damien and decides to take the matter into his own hands. Naturally, it doesn't go as he planned. D/G


**Three Nights**

by Shadowy Star

July 2006

Disclaimer: I don't own the Coldfire trilogy. It belongs to C.S. Friedman. I do own this story. Do not archive or translate or otherwise use the story without permission.

**Summary:** Gerald notices something wrong about Damien and decides to take the matter into his own hands. Naturally, it doesn't go as he planned.

**A/N:** Just another variation of my There-is-a-stranger-in-my-bed-How-did-that-happen? -theme.

* * *

He sneaked into the small hotel room and closed the door behind him without making a sound.

Earth-fae lit everything with its pale bluish glowing. He noticed a springbolt propped against a wall, a sword in its sheath, a belt with a pistol on it –_He's becoming reasonable,_ he thought, _about time,_– beside the bed. Light of two full moons fell through the window and collected in pools of liquid silver and blue on the floor and the bed. Casca's small crescent added its whiter light to the intricate pattern.

Blankets, thrown aside at a summer night's heat, and a tanned body on the bed. Shoulder-long, chestnut-brown hair, glowing softly where Prima's silver-blue light touched it. A face, so endlessly familiar, sharp angles of cheekbone and jaw, an inviting mouth. Thick lashes that looked soft to the touch. Full lips…

His gaze followed a stray ray of blue light down the ex-Priest's body. Unconsciously, Gerald licked his lips. Smooth golden skin, now hued almost silver in the pale moonlight. Well-defined muscles outlined in deep shadows. Stark silver lines of old scars. Gerald had seen them all, back then in the Rakh Lands as Damien'd lain insensible, fever shaking his body.

Origins of some he knew. There was that thick line across the left side of the other man's abdomen – a reminder of a pirate's sword. Four thin lines on his upper right thigh – that of a fae-born's claw. A large oval of fine points – the bite of a snow sheele, a vicious wolverine-like creature with razor-sharp teeth. There were more, all of them a testament to Damien's strength and will to survive even without a possibility of Healing at the moment of injury. Gerald shuddered to imagine how much more there would have been without the other man's fae Talent and dedication that had made him the best Healer Gerald ever met.

White light of Erna's errant moon flooded the room, further illuminating the sleeping form on the bed. It traced a strong arm and pooled in an open, callused palm and Gerald couldn't help but follow it with his eyes to long fingers, strong yet elegant, so much different from his own slender ones. Damien's fingers twitched –probably in a dream– as if to remind Gerald that he wasn't welcome here and he averted his eyes.

He looked back at the wide expanse of chest and down the sculpted abdomen to narrow hips and long legs partially hidden under the blankets. One long foot was sticking out, as big as the rest of the man's body, two of the toes slightly crooked as if they had been broken long ago and their owner hadn't bothered to set the breaks correctly.

He ached to reach out to touch, to reveal the rest of the beautiful body to his hungry eyes, to feel the warmth radiating from soft skin and the life throbbing beneath.

With an effort, he wrenched his gaze away. He'd only intended to take care the other was sleeping soundly when he'd entered the room.

When he'd first seen his former companion yesterday after two years of separation he'd barely recognized him.

Damien had looked as if he'd gotten very little sleep over a long period of time, frame thinner, face drawn, dark shadows beneath those beautiful hazel-brown eyes. Exactly like he'd looked back then on their way to the Eastern Continent, if not worse. That worried Gerald immensely. What the Hell had Damien done to himself? And where had he been? It had taken a few coins and a lot of convincing to get what very little information Damien had given about his person from the innkeeper. Damien Vryce, recently from Faraday. Traveling south. Nothing more. _Damn,_ Gerald thought, frustrated. He hated working with incomplete data.

Wherever Damien had been, the place or the journey had removed even more weight from his frame, leaving only well-shaped bones and strong, now wiry muscles behind. It'd added more color to his already golden-tanned skin, making it almost glow. With his chiseled physique and classic features, those alluringly curved lips and warm hazel eyes, the other man was still beautiful, and Gerald had always been appreciative of beauty. His sense of aesthetics had shaped his life in more than one way so was it any wonder that he'd admired it in Damien? Still did. And even if there was some silver in Damien's hair it didn't lessen his beauty – it enhanced it.

Gerald didn't even notice he was moving until his shins made a painful and noisy connection with the side of the bed. Damien didn't as much as twitch in his sleep so the sedative Gerald had slipped into his beer must have worked out. He dropped to his knees and put his elbows on the bed, intertwining his fingers, placing his chin onto them. He would just stay a little longer to make sure the dose was enough to make Damien sleep the night. Just a little longer…

He awoke with a start at the soft light of false dawn behind the window.

Cursing violently under his breath and wondering what the Hell he'd been thinking to fall asleep like that, he left the room, shutting the door behind him carefully.

* * *

The door fell silently into place again, letting Gerald in, leaving him smiling at the déjà vu.

Beyond the window, the last rays of sunset danced hypnotically across the sky. He'd given Damien an hour after his retreat from the bar. The other man was looking slightly better in the morning, Gerald had thought, watching him from his seat in the corner. Still, the simple fact Damien hadn't realized someone was watching him, was alarming enough. Were he whole, he'd have felt Gerald's gaze on him immediately right the first night when Gerald had walked into the hotel's small yet very exclusive bar.

_Where the Hell have you been? What's happened? _he couldn't help thinking now.

Damien stirred in his sleep, tugging at a corner of his pillow so he could rest his head more comfortably.

Gerald smiled. How many times had he watched that little habit of Damien's on their journeys? The other man never seemed to care how hard, cold and rocky the ground was that he was sleeping on but he always placed his head on his arm, seeking a comfortable position. There was something so very childlike in it, something so innocent… Gerald loved to watch Damien sleep.

He stepped closer and before his mind could even decide it wanted to form the intention, his feet had already carried him to the bed and his body had sat down on it. Damien snuggled more into his pillow and mumbled something under his breath. Gerald reached out and brushed a stray lock of hair from Damien's forehead. As cliche as it sounded, the other man looked peaceful and angelic, lying there with his skin colored deepest bronze by the sunset, brown hair tousled, hazel eyes hidden behind dark lashes… Oh how he'd longed to see those eyes again...

Gerald didn't even realize he was about to touch that warm skin when it happened. His fingertips tingled. The skin beneath was soft, smooth and Gerald couldn't stop himself from letting his index trace a slightly curved brow, a high cheekbone down to those tempting lips. He touched his thumb to Damien's lower lip, stroking gently, and those lips parted slightly as if in invitation. Oh Hell… How went that line about resisting a temptation by giving in? Right.

He caressed the other's face carefully.

Gerald exactly remembered the moment when he realized he was in love with Damien Kilcannon Vryce. Looking back now, he saw the attraction had always been there and he was fairly sure the other man had also noticed it. Of course, them being who they'd been they'd fought it every step.

He remembered the trip to the Rakh Lands and all the times they'd almost been at each other's throats. Then, there'd been his capture and being rescued by Damien and the horror of now owing the infuriating Priest a life debt. More time spent in each other's company and then this one moment of absolute, crystal clarity when his other had walked into the Keeper of Souls' fortress all alone, possibly never to return. And Gerald had known then, deep down in his soul that he loved Damien with all that was left of his being. He remembered waiting for the signal, keeping a tight rein on his feelings. Being in the tunnels next, and the Dark Ones approaching and he'd done the only thing that could've saved them, exposing the underground corridors –and himself– to daylight. He remembered the searing pain that Damien, too, had felt over their link and the wave of reassurance, strength and sympathy flooding back to him from the other man. It'd been then when for the first time in many centuries that he'd allowed himself to hope.

That hope, however, he'd shattered with his own hand later, setting his trap. And though he hadn't known any other way to convince the Undying Prince completely, the look of utter betrayal in Damien's beautiful hazel-brown eyes had effectively broken his own heart. He remembered Working the knife, remembered his despair and a stubborn hope that Damien might, maybe, understand his reasons even if he might not forgive.

He remembered Damien's face above him when the Priest had come to free him from his crystal restraints. The other man had been furious, and Gerald remembered excruciating fear. He'd known back then that the Priest wasn't going to abandon him but the thought Damien could despise him had hurt more than sunlight ever could. And then the other man had freed him and, though severely injured from the beatings and torture he'd taken … Damien had smiled at him. That smile, so beautiful, so warm, had shattered the remnants of his already broken heart and he'd known, without a doubt, that he would do anything to keep his other safe even if it meant to give his own life.

That thought had stayed with him until the end. Standing on Mount Shaitan, he hadn't been thinking of humanity. The sacrifice he'd made was all for Damien – for him to have a world to live in, a world where he would be safe and maybe even happy even if it wasn't with him, Gerald. It'd been enough to know that his other would live. It still was. And yet... Oh how bitterly had fate cheated him back then in his Keep... Having tasted being human again, with all its urges and needs, having again begun to hope... Gerald had found himself unable to leave the ex-Priest alone, had come to Black Ridge Pass to talk, to have a last look, to try and ask forgiveness. But he'd been too much of a coward to actually ask for that. And so, he'd left and tried to avoid looking back with varying degrees of success so when he'd seen his other here so unexpectedly... Was it really so surprising he couldn't leave him alone now?

Still caressing Damien's face, Gerald concentrated on taking it in, ignoring the tears that stubbornly refused stopping running down his cheeks. Oh if only...

He sighed heavily, letting his hand fall from the other man's face.

When the first glow of the Core began to chase away the night, he still sat there, his eyes never leaving Damien's form.

* * *

This night, Gerald had waited longer, way past nightfall, before sneaking into Damien's room. This night was to be the last. Tomorrow, right in the morning, he would leave and return to his own life. Or at least, he would try to.

But this last night he would lay next to his beloved even if it was for one night only, never to be repeated. And after that night he would be alone again. He'd been used to being alone once, and he would again. But how could one get used to that emptiness inside, to the loneliness, so cold and unforgiving...

He walked up to the bed and stilled, listening to the other man's soft breath, making sure he was really asleep. The warm glow of a small lamp painted the planes and angles of his other's face in light and shadows, curtains drawn shut.

Very slowly, carefully, quietly he put one knee on the bed. When the mattress dipped slightly, not enough to wake his other, he shifted his weight to it and drew the other leg up to kneel on the bed completely. Then, he inched slowly closer until he was hovering over the other man, close enough to lean down and kiss those lips... But no. Instead, he reached out with one hand, intending to touch along a stubble-covered cheek.

Only to find his wrist caught in a death grip.

His eyes flew to Damien's face to find the other wide awake, beautiful hazel eyes open and alert.

"Did you honestly believe a Healer would mistake the effects of a sedative for those of too much beer?"

Damien flung him aside easily and sat up, blankets pooling around his hips.

"What, no comment?" the other man said coldly. "That would be a first."

"Damien," Gerald said for the lack of alternatives. How did one explain that situation? _I'm sorry, I'm a sentimental fool and I wanted to sleep next to you?_ _Great idea, Gerald,_ he thought. _You should consider yourself lucky if he doesn't report you for attempted sexual assault_.

"And now we know you remember my name. How reassuring." The other man's voice, usually warm, was dripping with icy, sharp sarcasm. Gerald cringed.

"I … I was concerned," he tried.

"About my well-being? For some inexplicable reason I find it hard to believe."

Again, Gerald recoiled sharply. The other's hazel jewels were cold as polar seas, showing nothing. That was not how he'd pictured their second meeting after that fateful day in his former Keep would be. It was almost like they were back to theit very first days, back to distrust and hatred. _Oh the irony of it,_ Gerald thought. _Well, that's what you wanted, didn't you, a new beginning, all ties cut... – _all but this one, this connection to the man who held his heart in his strong hands, and was about to shatter it any moment.

"Still speechless? Good. These days, I like it when there's nothing to say."

"Do you hate me so much?" he asked, his heart breaking because it hurt, hurt like Hell to even think. Something of it must have showed in his eyes because the other man frowned.

"Hate? I don't hate you. I can't remember when I did." The voice softened a bit, yet those beautiful eyes –oh, once so warm– remained cold and hard.

Gerald dared to hope. "You … don't...?"

"I can't hate a creature for doing what's its nature. Like the snake that bit the nu-turtle even when it resulted in them both drowning." Gerald, of course, remembered the fable that had been old even before the first man on Earth dared to dream of stars. So this was how Damien saw him? As some poisonous creature that could not control its impulses and would strike out even at the one it loved most? Yet that was exactly what he'd done. He'd hurt Damien, and at this thought his heart broke some more and he wondered distantly how its metaphorical pain managed to exceed the very physical pain of an heart attack and whether or not it was possible to die of it. He had hurt his loved one, had walked away... Maybe if he'd stayed instead of running off to his new life... And now there was nothing he could do, nothing at all. When all Damien felt was that unconcerned, detached, cool indifference...

"Would it mean anything to you if I said I was sorry?" And he was, oh he was. He just hoped that somehow Damien would find it in his generous heart to forgive him.

Those hard eyes met his straight on.

"_Are_ you sorry?" There was no curiosity in the flat voice. In fact, there was nothing. Nothing at all. Oh, what had he done?

"Yes," he said softly, looking into shards of hazel-brown ice. "More than I can say."

"A bit too late, don't you think?" And oh, this hurt, too – a white hot knife straight through his already broken heart, heart once healed by this very man. His throat tightened and he bit his bottom lip, hard, almost drawing blood.

"More than I could say even if I lived for nine hundred years or longer." For a split second the surface of those eyes shattered and an abyss of pain gazed back at Gerald, penetrating easily the sorry tatters of his defenses. What did his own black heart matter when his other hurt so much? The other man, however, recovered so quickly Gerald wasn't sure he hadn't imagined it.

"Damien," he made, reaching out very, very carefully to touch the other man's hand with his fingertips. His hand shook. "Oh Damien, please..."

His hand was stopped before it could reach its destination, callused fingers enveloping his own in a strong grip. He let it fall to the other man's lap, Damien's own hand still around it.

"Please what?" Damien said, and his voice carried just the faintest shade of emotion and Gerald could have jumped in joy because anything was better than the dead tones from before. Because now, he had a chance – a minute shred of a tiny scrap of a small bit of a chance but still, still, a chance.

"Anything," he replied with absolute honesty. He would do anything. "Anything, Damien."

His hand was suddenly flung aside with such force he almost tumbled to the floor.

"Go," Damien said, bitterness black and deep in that beautiful voice but that hated smooth surface had finally vanished from his eyes, the sorrow in those hazel brown depths tearing Gerald wide open. "You will anyway tomorrow even if I let you stay the night."

"No!" he flung himself forward and slid his arms firmly around his beloved's neck, holding on as if his life depended on it – and maybe it did. "For how long have you been awake tonight?" he asked, drawing back a little and frantically searching his other's face. Maybe, just maybe...

"I haven't been asleep. Neither on the last two nights," Damien answered softly and Gerald breathed a small sigh of relief.

"Then you know I came back. I'll tell you the truth if it somehow helps. When I came here tonight, it was with full intention to let this night be the last one. I wanted to sleep next to you this one time, then leave tomorrow and try to go on with my life. But when I saw you I knew I couldn't." He tightened his arms around his love. "Where, in all of Erna, would I go if all I ever wanted is right here, in my arms?"

Damien moved then and brought some distance between them, confusion and disbelief warring in his eyes, much warmer now but something cold still lurked beneath. Something Gerald, to his utter surprise, recognized as fear. Damien was … afraid? That was impossible, Damien had never been afraid of him. Of horrors he'd created in those nightmares, yes, but never, _never_ of him. So what was his other afraid of now?

But afraid or not, those beloved hazel-brown eyes never left his own. "I don't think you're saying what I hear you saying. I don't think you _know_ what you're saying."

_Oh. Oh, Love,_ Gerald thought when understanding hit him, a fierce tenderness tightening his throat until he couldn't breathe.

Gathering all his courage –which wasn't that much at the moment–, Gerald leaned up.

"Then let me show you." And he touched his lips to Damien's beautiful ones.

Perfect. Complete. Perfect.

There were no other words to describe the feeling of absolute rightness at that soft touch. And then, Damien's mouth moved against his own and the intensity and sweetness of it engulfed him, healing his shattered heart in the process. He broke the kiss and brought his hands up to his other's face, stroking it gently and tears threatened for the second time this night but it didn't matter, didn't matter at all. Damien must have read it somehow because the look in the brilliant jewels softened, full of quiet wonder. Hands were in his hair, gently disheveling his braid. He leaned his head back into the touches, biting his lip to suppress a moan.

Damien leaned in and kissed it right off his lips and Gerald opened his mouth, inviting the other in. For the next few minutes the rational part of his brain shut down and when oxygen became a necessity and Damien finally released his lips, he barely remembered how to breathe. When he did and his thoughts cleared a little he remembered there was, indeed, something to say.

Searching again his love's warm eyes, he drew a deep breath.

"I love you," he said, steeling himself for possible reactions. But nothing could have readied him for the one he got.

Oh. _Oh._ He'd seen the most beautiful things, vistas and people on Erna in both his lifetimes but nothing, nothing came even close to the look on Damien's face – the happiness and joy in his smile, the small trace of amusement in the quirk of his brow and the most beautiful of all – the hope and love radiating from his eyes. And surely, no sound was more beautiful than his beloved's voice as he answered.

"I love you, too."

Forming a coherent thought became difficult then so instead he rained kisses onto his other's face and any patch of skin he could reach. His fingers seemed to know where to go without his conscious effort, trailing down the sculpted body, then up again into Damien's soft hair, burying themselves deep into the thick brown richness. He left one hand where it was and brought the other to his other man's chest, fingertips resting against a slightly furry sternum, feeling a rapid heartbeat beneath. Applying all his experience, he set out on a quest to prove his other just how much he loved him.

Damien seemed to have a quest of his own, if the places where his inquiring fingers went were anything to go by. Gerald groaned softly at his lack of foresight. Thoughts of when and with whom the other man had acquired his considerable knowledge made a certain green-eyed monster have a fit of epic proportions in the back of his mind but then Damien kissed him again, and all of it ceased to matter.

"It's all your fault, your and your attraction's," he made an attempt to regain at least some control of the situation and his very aroused body. "I even forgot to introduce myself."

Damien laughed sharply but without bitterness. Instead, something very, very mischievous was in that laugh and potentially dangerous. "As though you ever intended to."

He smiled faintly at that. "Gerald da Silva, at your service."

"At my … _service_?" Damien asked, sliding on top of him again, his smile widening into a truly evil grin.

Gerald chuckled. "You know, for an ex-Priest, you're a really wicked man."

_FIN_

**Extra Notes:**

1) I think Erna would have its own version of 'The Scorpion and the Frog' fable.

2) Also done as an exercise in describing male physique which I'm not as good at as at describing female body since I find the latter easier to draw. I wanted a certain level of realism thus the scars because sorry, Champion of the Order or not, no one is that good and I think there would have been situations where Healing was impossible due to unavailability of the fae, f.e. after a quake or on a ship or because of sheer exhaustion.


End file.
